


breaking murphy's law

by nowrunalong



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, F/F, Hurt/Comfort
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-22
Updated: 2015-02-22
Packaged: 2018-03-14 13:07:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,303
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3411728
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nowrunalong/pseuds/nowrunalong
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Prompt: Rose gets hurt and Clara comforts her.</p>
            </blockquote>





	breaking murphy's law

It was one of _those_ days.

Rose had been running late for class so she’d cut across the park. _Of course_ she’d slipped and gotten mud all up her front. _Of course_ she’d been wearing her new jeans. 

Dejected, she’d decided to skip and went back to the dormitory to take a shower.

It was only 11 AM and her day was already ruined, Rose thought to herself as she ran the razor up her leg. Still, she was an optimist. It couldn’t possibly get worse.

That was when she nicked her ankle.

Rose unwittingly let out a gasp and watched as the blood trickled down her leg and swirled around the drain at the bottom of the shower stall. Rose bent down to inspect the cut: it looked deep and it stung a lot. And the water wasn’t helping. Wincing, she turned the shower off and bit her lip to stop herself from making another sound.

Damn it.

Well, she’d just have to go back to her room and stick a band-aid on it. Hopefully she still had some left. Now she just had to—

 _Damn it_.

 _Her towel_.

She’d been in such a rush to get to the bathroom that she’d forgotten to stop by her room for a towel and clean clothes. She would have to put her muddy clothes back on and then come back and shower again.

Rose’s eyes stung.

Don’t start crying, she thought fervently. Please don’t start crying.

“Are you okay?”

The voice of the girl on the other side of the curtain was hesitant.

“It’s just that, well,” the voice continued, “it looks like you’re bleeding.”

Rose looked down. The water in the bottom of the shower stall was still stained red.

“I’m—no,” Rose started. “I nicked my leg shavin' an’ I forgot my towel an’ my clean clothes an’—“

“Want me to grab a towel for you?” the girl asked kindly. Rose noticed now that she had a Northern accent.

“Would you? Thank you so much.”

“No problem! I’ll be right back.”

Rose stood shivering as she listened to the door click open and then shut again and waited for the girl to return.

It didn’t take her very long.

“You still in there?”

“I’m hardly gonna run starkers through the halls.”

“Good point. Alright, here you are.”

A small hand reached round the curtain; Rose took the proffered towel with a sigh of relief and thanked the girl again.

“You’ve still got that cut to look after, though.”

The aforementioned cut still hurt. It was also still bleeding.

Rose wrapped herself in the towel and pushed the curtain aside.

The girl on the other side was short and had pretty dark brown hair. Actually, everything about her was pretty, from her face to her clothes to the dress that she was clutching in her hands.

“I brought you this. You, um, mentioned you forgot your clothes?” The girl held out the garment. The patterned material wasn’t something Rose usually wore, but she liked it. “I don’t know how far down the hall you live, but—here. So that you don’t have to walk out with just a towel on.”

“You’re a lifesaver. What room are you in? I’ll bring your dress back as soon as I’ve found somethin' else clean to put on.”

“305. And don’t worry about it! Whenever’s convenient for you. I’ve just done laundry.”

 _Laundry_.

Rose cursed again.

What was that saying? _Anything that can go wrong will go wrong?_

“You haven’t been in a while either, huh?”

The girl smiled in an understanding way, adorable dimples forming in her cheeks.

“Nope. These were my only clean jeans.” Rose gestured to the heap on the floor. “But now I need to wash them, too. I’ve got so much to do, it’s gonna be two loads.”

Rose was quickly feeling overwhelmed.

“I can help you, if you like! I haven’t got class this afternoon.”

“Oh no, that’s okay. You’ve—you’ve already—”

Rose took a deep breath to calm herself.

“I like to help! Besides, I’m new here. I’d love to get to know some people on this floor. Oh! I’m Clara, by the way. Clara Oswald.”

“Rose Tyler.”

“Well, Rose Tyler. You should get dressed and look after that ankle of yours before you leave a stain on the floor. Might want to wrap it up so that you don’t drip blood on the hall carpet."

“Good idea.”

Rose pulled the dress on over her head then tugged the towel out from underneath it, slinging it over her arm with her dirty clothes and grabbing a length of toilet paper to tie around her leg.

“When are you off to the laundry room?”

“Soon as I get some knickers on.”

Rose let loose her tongue-touched grin as she looked back at Clara before opening the bathroom door and striding out into the dim hallway.

The brunette stood in place, momentarily tongue-tied, before following the blonde out the door.

—

Clara waited outside Rose’s door as the blonde stepped into her room to find some clean undergarments.

What was taking her so long?

Clara knocked gently.

“Are you okay?” she asked, for the second time that day.

When there was no answer, she pushed open the door to dorm 314.

Rose was sitting on the side of the bed. She was hunched over miserably; tear tracks marked her cheeks. It was almost like she was a completely different girl from the one who’d given Clara the cheeky grin in the bathroom doorway. She looked up and rubbed her eyes as Clara came to sit down next to her.

“Sorry for barging in; you just seemed like you might like some company. You can tell me to go away.”

“No, ’s’fine. It’s just one of those days, you know? When everythin' goes wrong.” Rose stared down at her ankle. The blood had soaked through the thin bathroom tissue.

“We should deal with that,” Clara decided. “Where are your bandages?”

“In that drawer.”

Rose pointed.

Clara got up and found the box before sitting back down next to Rose.

“Swing around?”

Rose did as she was told, changing her angle on the bed so that she could swing her leg up. Clara sat Rose’s foot in her lap and carefully untied the makeshift bandage, her fingers brushing against Rose’s leg. The skin there was soft. Clara pressed the clean bit of the toilet paper—damp from the water Rose had missed towelling off—against the cut with one hand as she fished a large band-aid from the box with the other and unwrapped it. She removed the cheap tissue from Rose’s leg again and, with both hands now, pressed the adhesive bandage over the cut, smoothing it down.

“There.”

Rose gave a small smile.

“Thanks. You didn’t have to do that.”

“Didn’t think you should get up yet.”

Clara’s business-like tone couldn’t completely mask the warmth underneath. She hoped that she wasn’t blushing; she turned away to look unseeingly out the window, just in case.

“Anyway.”

“Yeah.”

Rose swung her leg back onto the floor and stood up.

“That’s much better.”

“Good! Laundry now?”

“You sure you want to help out with something so mundane?”

“‘Course. Got nothing else to do. Besides, I’m a good neighbour.”

Clara grinned at her. 

Rose couldn’t help but to return the grin as she handed Clara a bag of dirty laundry, then grabbed the other one herself.

Well, Rose thought, Clara's joyful voice echoing through the staircase from behind her, a lot of things went wrong today. But a lot more things _could_ have gone wrong. It could have been worse. 

Actually, she decided, as Clara rushed ahead to hold the door for her, flashing that dimpled smile again, her afternoon was off to a pretty good start.


End file.
